Eötvös was presented the award by La Biennale president Paolo Baratta.
?As part of the strong musical tradition of Hungary, which boasts figures such as Bartók, Ligeti and Kurtag, Peter Eötvös personally experienced the most important events in musical experimentation from the Sixties onward,? La Biennale said.
?A precocious conductor with considerable talent, he served for many years as assistant to Karlheinz Stockhausen, as both a composer and very early on as the preferred conductor for his works, including the important compositions created at La Scala thirty years ago (including Donnerstag aus Licht, 1981),? the laudation read.
?Boulez too, in the Seventies, named him musical director of the newly founded Ensemble Intercontemporain. These extraordinary experiences at the side of the greatest composers immersed Eötvös into a plentiful river of musical thought and practice, preparing an absolutely complete musician and craftsman, who over the past twenty years has demonstrated extraordinarily fertile creative power as a composer. In both his callings, Eötvös brings together an exceptionally fine ear and level of knowledge, with iconoclastic and experimental delight.?
Eötvös conducted the Freiburg Radio Orchestra at the festival?s opening ceremony. The concert included works by Bartók, Stravinsky and Eötvös himself.
The 55th International Festival of Contemporary Music of the Biennale di Venezia runs from September 24 until October 1.
